grantss Based on the true story of Jack Reed (played by Warren Beatty) and Louise Bryant (Diane Keaton), two American socialists and writers. During WW1 they actively campaigned for and wrote about socialist causes. When the news of the Russian Revolution broke this was seen as the chance for socialism to gain a greater foothold and popularity. Reed went to Russia to see what could be learned from the revolution and took the ideas back to the US, forming the Communist Labor Party of America. Things weren't all plain-sailing though, both in the relationship between Reed and Bryant and in politics.Written and directed by Warren Beatty, the movie is really just a medium for Beatty to express his political views. And what misguided views they are! Ultra-left-wing, to the point of glorifying an incredibly reprehensible totalitarian regime.Before we even get to that, we have the background, setting out Reed and Bryant's relationship plus their politics. This is incredibly dull and padded, taking about 90 minutes for something that could have taken 15-30 minutes.The movie does pick up pace towards the end, but, as mentioned, not in a good direction.The ending is quite emotional, though to get to it you have to sit through a 190-or-so minute movie that could have been done in about 120 minutes.Despite the idealistic, misguided plot and extravagant (in terms of running time) direction, can't fault the performances. Beatty puts in a solid performance as Reed and Keaton is great as Bryant. Good supporting cast too: Jack Nicholson (as Eugene O'Neill), Paul Sorvino and Gene Hackman, among others.

Emil Bakkum A film with the title Reds must be a propaganda film, and it actually is (joke: propaganda is a gentlemanly goose). From a political point of view it just hawks about the familiar worn-out stereotypes. If you like to deepen your political insights, this is not the film for you. However, the film also contains the delightful love story between Louise Bryant and John Reed - in the fantasy of the script writers. It is definitely worth while to watch this struggle between two very independent minds, who increasingly become to value their mutual relationship and company. It is not a cohabitation for the sake of the cats. Nevertheless, since politics is my real thing, I shall confine my comments to the historical scenes. At the start of the twentieth century politics was a mess. The democracy was anything but accepted as the best political system, not even in Europe. As a consequence of the failing liberal system (robber barons etcetera), there was a large support for unsound ideas like revolutionary socialism (Leninism), anarchism and fascism. This relative chaos had an enormous pull on intellectual adventurers, who believed that they could supply the right left-wing answers. Often they advocated a system of workers councils (which obviously does not work). To be fair, I know nothing about John Reed. But his case is very similar to Karl Radek (present in the film), and Dutch revolutionaries like Anton Pannekoek and Herman Gorter (should have been present). The normal system had failed so miserably, that their weird visions could gain some acceptance. Unlike the opportunist Lenin they were individualists, dogmatists and fanatics. This explains why Reed radicalizes: he starts as a supporter of president Wilson and the AFL, joins the IWW, forms his own socialist sect, and ends his life in Soviet Russia. He just can not settle. Abandon the search for truth, settle for a good fantasy. The script shows how Reed exclaims to Radek (or was it Zinoviev?): "Individualism is the true source of rebellion!" This libertarian stance is hard to reconcile with his socialist sympathies. Sure, you are unique, just like anyone else. In addition the film suggests that in his last days Reed distances himself from the revolution. He even tries to stop a charge of Red soldiers. This is stupendous, for in his actual final articles he still glorifies the Red Army. In such moments Reds does not stand to reason and seems to work on liberal propaganda. Having said that, the general picture remains credible. The interludes with real old acquaintances of Bryant and Reed repair some of the flaws in the script. They display how the common Russian people were misled in order to satisfy the lust for power of a ruthless party. This may be old news, but should not be forgotten. Man who leap off cliff jump to conclusion.

tieman64 "Our blindness to the results of systemic violence is perhaps most clearly perceptible in debates about communist crimes. Responsibility for communist crimes is ascribed an ideological source. But when one draws attention to the millions who died as a result from capitalist globalisation, from the tragedy of Mexico in the 16th century through to the Belgian Congo holocaust, responsibility is largely denied. All this seems just to have happened as the result of an 'objective' process, which nobody planned, and for which there was no 'Capitalist Manifesto'." - Zizek "Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past." - Marx Warren Beatty stars in, produces and directs "Reds", a 1981 epic about the life and career of journalist and activist John Reed. Diane Keaton co-stars as Louise Bryant, a feminist, activist and Reed's lover.Odd for a Hollywood production, let alone one released at the dawn of Reaganism, "Reds" both deals with the Russian Revolution and is sympathetic toward communism. Much of the film thus watches as Reed mingles with unionists, communists and documents the 1917 Bolshevik revolution, the subject of his 1919 book, "Ten Days That Shook The World".One of the most ballsy moments in human history, the October Revolution essentially saw different Marxist factions allying to usurp monarchy, feudalism and nascent capitalism. After their victory, Russia found itself surrounded, invaded and then essentially sequestered for the next 70 years. Utopian dreams would collapse and she quickly become a curious hybrid: an Imperialist nation like the then-contemporary Western Empires (though much less violent, by dint of much smaller colonial holdings), a giant socialist state (bringing genuine improvements to the lives of millions), a state capitalist command economy (and so antithetical to "Marxism") and a brutal dictatorial regime (which would incrementally dissolve after the death of Joseph Stalin).A similar movement happened in the 1780s, when the disparate forces of the French Revolution, influenced by thinkers like John Locke and Jean Rousseau, toppled monarchies, late-feudalism and cooked up many of what we now term "democratic principles" and "civil rights". They also enacted numerous "radical" policies (abolishing feudal dues owed to churches and landlords, nationalising land, creating constitutions etc) which we today take for granted, as well as popularising new political terminology (and even slang; the communist term of endearment, "comrade", comes from the French Revolution). Like the Russian Revolution, these "victories" were won through much violence, before their "gains" were set back by reactionary forces. Marx would call this "Bonapartism", a term he used to refer to any situation in which counter-revolutionary military officers seize power from revolutionaries, and then use selective reformism to co-opt the radicalism of the popular classes. The term was used by Leon Trotsky to refer to Stalin's regime.From the perspective of the lower classes, the French Revolution was ultimately lost, but it instigated countless "positive" changes across Europe. On the flip-side, it also forced the ruling class to morph, adapt and develop new means of control. The Russian Revolution (and German Revolution of 1918) was likewise lost, "communism" crushed across Europe and left-wing parties or labour movements murdered in the millions across most of Latin America, Asia, the Middle East and even at home in America. Still, out of these ashes, and the ashes of crushed labour groups, came minor "positive" changes: women's and minority rights, the shortening of work days, the end of the old Empires, the rise of nationalist/independent movements etc. On the flip-side, the ruling class once again morphed and adapted.So "Reds" charts broad movements which are as old as time itself. Each human epoch tends to find humanity constructing giant energy accumulation systems (feudalism, chattel slavery, theocracy, monarchy, capitalism etc) in which social hierarchies are set up and in which man exploits man. Those with power tend to win these class conflicts, with, arguably, minor benefits coming at the end of each cycle of conflict.Most of "Reds" deals with a rocky romantic relationship between Reed and Bryant. He's dedicated to his social activism and ignores her, she's seeking some semblance of independence but wants to be noticed. By the film's end, both have learnt to simultaneously pursue their own dreams whilst also giving to others. Their relationship symbolises the film's overall message, a message which Reed explicitly lays out toward the end of the film. "You don't think a man can be an individual and be true to the collective!" Reed yells, "You don't think a man can speak for his own country and speak for the International at the same time, or love his wife and still be faithful to the revolution! You separate a man from what he loves most, and what you do is purge what's unique in him! And when you purge what's unique in him, you purge dissent. And when you purge dissent, you kill the revolution! Dissent IS revolution!" In other words, "Reds" condemns the neurotic control society which the USSR became, but nevertheless advocates a kind of hybrid of collectivism and "independence", which of course was the the theoretical intention of 19th century communism anyway.Though interesting, "Reds" is slow, overlong and at times too conventional. The film also missteps by ignoring the brutal conditions of American workers, the Russian peasantry and so forth (even contemporary capitalism has 76 percent of Western workers living paycheck to paycheck, 1.3 billion globally in extreme poverty, 850 million in starvation, and roughly 80 percent of the world living on less than ten dollars a day), which has the unintended effect of painting Beatty's band of agitators and rabble rousers as hermetically sealed academics and intellectuals without a Cause. Jack Nicholson steals the show as Eugene O'Neal, an Irish-American playwright.7.5/10 – See "The Spy Who Came In From the Cold".

jackasstrange Reds is fits the definition of a boring film. It is slow paced, an historical drama that you probably have seen one thousand times before, and utterly uninteresting, I mean, it looks like something that you can learn in a history class or something. It clearly isn't a good film, no matter what you say. It follows this guy interpreted by Warren Beatty, that is a defender of the revolutionary's ideas. But again, I think it's worth noting to say that nothing interesting happens or whats or ever. The most exciting thing about this film are the discussions and the conflicts between him and his wife. That's not saying too much, since that it's not like the most original thing in the world. And they always ended together, despite all their differences. And yeah, the characters always makes a good film, so the result of the film is that bad mainly because the characters (based in real-life persons) in that film are just horrible. They seems to have no personality, and despite the film being 3 hours long, the development simply don't happens. It just shows the protagonist traveling around the world, and he occasionally appears in the middle of discussions and manifests, while her wife becomes frustrated and bored, but nothing made in a way that would push the attention of the viewer to the film. All in all, it's very boring, overlong, and I find the idea of putting 'witnesses' to comment about the events to be horrible. It's not a documentary, for god's sake! Anyways, it looks a very accurate depiction of the US situation in the mid 20s, with the poetry being faded by the political subjects, an interesting idea in fact, but as a film, it has nothing to offer, at least for me. The cinematography, the sound, the editing, art direction, the acting, the story itself looked sub-par or average at best. It looks like a film intended to be taken as much more as something to watch in the school than anything else, or something that would pass in the History channel. 5.0/10